Sunday, March 17, 2013

‘Dharma’ in Hinduism is different from the Western
concept of religion. It is a code related to moral nature. There is a very
negligible difference between this ‘dharma’ and ‘spiritualism’ whereas in the
Western concept, ‘religion’ and ‘spiritualism’ are two different concepts. So
society or religion always plays a role to suppress the sexuality and as the
patriarchal dominance is more on these fields, questions about the morality and
the politics of sex are usually considered in isolation from issues about
gender and erotic sex.

But in spiritualism, it is related to an individual’s
understanding for salvation and freedom. For Hindu spiritualism sexuality is
represented as ‘kama’. It is one of the four necessities, four aims of life:
Dharma, Artha (material goods), Kama and Moksha (liberation from the cycle of
death and rebirth)

Kama is defined as the enjoyment of appropriate objects
by the five senses of hearing, feeling, seeing, tasting and smelling, assisted
by the mind together with the soul. The ingredient in this is a peculiar
contact between the organ of sense and its object, and the consciousness of
pleasure which arises from that contact. This is called Kama.

In Hindu spiritualism, Kama is not at all a ‘prohibited’
subject or we don’t find any ‘male dominance’ there. Taking the lovers’ longing
for reunion as a metaphor for the soul's longing for union with the divine
makes sexuality more acceptable in ‘Sufism.’ And in a later period, ‘Hindu
Bhaktism’ by Sri Chaitanya also adopted this idea easily.

But in Western philosophy, the natural and the
universal are sharply divided -- like heaven and earth. The division of tasks
between heaven and earth, suffering on earth and happiness beyond, is part and
parcel of Western culture and its philosophy, religion and mythology.
Westerners tend to see the sensuous world around us as false or illusory and
the world 'beyond' as real. But in Hindu spiritualism, when you are in your
sexual desire, you might sense complete presence in your sensuous world, a
perfect moment which is spiritual, natural and carnal all at once.